For the Record: It's all about Pride

Sunday

Apr 25, 2010 at 12:01 AMApr 25, 2010 at 12:18 AM

Pride. That’s the new team name of the somewhat unique Bloomfield-Honeoye boys high school lacrosse team. The Pride have been a team-in-progress over the last five years, starting in 2005 as a junior varsity team, progressing to a fine 5-1 record so far in this their third year of varsity play.

Ron Wilson, staff writer

Pride. That’s the new team name of the somewhat unique Bloomfield-Honeoye boys high school lacrosse team. The Pride have been a team-in-progress over the last five years, starting in 2005 as a junior varsity team, progressing to a fine 5-1 record so far in this their third year of varsity play.

While getting a high school sports program together between two schools such as these presents a myriad of hurdles, including coordination with two athletic directors, two transportation supervisors, and two different sets of Codes of Conduct. But in the case of two schools such as Honeoye and Bloomfield, who have built up such heated and storied rivalries against one another over the years in every sport, the biggest problem must have been the student-athletes ability to get over the ingrained competitive nature between each other.
Apparently not with this team.

“Not once in these five years have we ever had a problem with the kids being from different schools,” says B-H coach Jack Beaney. “I mean these kids prepare themselves for nine months a year of banging their heads against each other trying to play to an advantage against each other and then for three months they find themselves practicing and playing in games together with a common goal of winning together. It’s unbelievable how they adjust from one situation to the other.”

On many different levels throughout their years of playing school sports, student-athletes from Bloomfield and Honeoye had always played against each other. There are many examples of current Pride teammates having played against each other earlier in this school year. None more glaring than between Bloomfield’s Luke Anderson and Honeoye’s Sean Beaney. The two seniors have knocked each other around on the soccer pitch in multiple Bomber-Bulldog games over the years. In the beginning, rivalries and all of the things done and said on the soccer pitch by each other’s teammates in the heat of the battle were hard to forget.

“In the earlier years the Honeoye soccer team had a better record than ours,” said Anderson. “And for the most part it didn’t matter so much. It’s gotten better, learning to accept each other. It’s been a lot fun. We’re all good friends. It’s actually been pretty rewarding being able to see the other side of somebody you compete so hard against at times.”

Anderson’s fall soccer opponent, Beaney, agrees.

“Yeah, it’s been a lot of fun,” he laughs. “It’s like a local beach ball game in that nobody really cares who they are playing with because we are all having fun and working hard together with a common goal of winning. It’s just another friend and teammate on the field is how I think we all look at it.”

While there is no doubt that bringing these two school’s student-athletes together presents all sorts of hoops to jump through, coach Beaney points out one thing that certainly helps the situation.

“These two school districts are so close that some of these kids are almost neighbors,” he said. “Some of these kids almost live across the street from each other. So it’s not like they only know each other on a competitive level. It’s because of things like that that I think I’ve never seen anything even close to one of our kids from one school holding something against another from the other school. At the end of each day these kids did nothing but work hard with each other. They never stop working together. This is the most pridefull group I have ever worked with.”

Pride. The student-athletes from these two schools successfully make this single-team concept work with their out-of-lacrosse-season-opponents because they have lots of it.

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